Revolution specs, price sort-of revealed. Ma

[Lord Nepenthean]

Article: http://www.gamesarefun.com/news.php?newsid=5868

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News - Revolution tech specs revealed
Posted by Ashton Liu at 10:23:26 AM EST on 12.7.2005.

Nintendo has always been tight lipped about major projects, and their current endeavor, the Revolution, is no exception. When the Revolution was first announced, a Nintendo executive had said that the new system would be "two-to-three times more powerful than GameCube." However, this statement was later rendered moot when Nintendo said that it was incorrect, and there has since been no inkling of just how powerful the Revolution will exactly be.

Until now. If IGN is right, that is.

Certain developers have said that the initial prediction of the Revolution's hardware strength was accurate; one third party developer remarked, "To be honest, it's not much more powerful than an Xbox. It's like a souped up Xbox. But it's the controller that makes the difference and the controller is really nice."

Also of note is that exact details of the Revolution's raw power, while still sparse, have come out; the system will reportedly have 128 MB of RAM, possibly less; the Revolution will build on the GameCube's 24MB of 1T-SRAM and 16MB of D-RAM (40MB) by adding an addition 64MB of 1T-SRAM, totaling out to be 104 MB, and that's discounting the 512 MB flash RAM and the Hollywood GPU's on-board memory, which has been said to be 3 MB in size. Also, while exact clock rates of the internal CPU and GPU of the Revolution were not revealed, one developer had this to say: "Basically, take a GameCube, double the clock rate of the CPU and GPU and you're done."

Recent rumors of the Revolution's medium being able to store up to 12 GB of data have turned out to be false, as the Revolution's discs will be able to hold 4.7 GB on a single layer disc and 8.5 GB on a dual layer - a major increase from the GameCube medium, which had a capacity of 1.5 GB.

While the numbers may disappoint hardcore tech heads, in the end, however, they are just numbers; Nintendo (and the developers working on the Revolution) have stressed time and again that since the Revolution is not intended to go head-to-head with the PS3 or Xbox 360, Nintendo has refrained from pumping in expensive RAM and hardware into their machine. Developers have pointed out that the Revolution's design will put it at a very affordable price to consumers - most developers have said that a launch price of $149 is viable, and some have even said that a launch price of $99 is a possibility as well.

[Izret101]

That would be god damned amazing.

[CatchFiveBats]

This makes me giddy.  I am so glad that Nintendo isn't trying to build some mega-system to compete with Microsoft and Sony, partly because they know they don't really have a chance, and because they've figured out that MORE POWER DOESN'T MEAN BETTER GAMES.  And with that kind of launch price, my wallet won't be hurting like it would if I had bought a 360 (or PS3, once it's out).  Thank you, Nintendo.

- Zac

[tholly]

if its in the $99 to $149 price range, i might just have to pick one up on the launch date.....its affordable compared to the other new systems

[Hydrobond]

If the launch price is $99, i will be picking it up as soon as it comes out.  Any word on if Revolution is backwards compatable with Game Cube?

[yap]

Yes, it's supposed to be backwards compatible with everything.

[shaggy]

If the launch price is $99, i will be picking it up as soon as it comes out.  Any word on if Revolution is backwards compatable with Game Cube?

The Revolution is supposed to be compatible with the Gamecube.  I will definately be getting this system first if it is priced at $99.  Even $149 for  a launch price for a next gen system.  What an awesome price.

[TraderJake]

If it does release for $99.99, it will sell a lot, regardless of processing power. If it sells for $149.99, it will probably still sell a lot.

I must say though that as long as the price is not astronomical I will be getting this system on launch day, as I think the games that will be shown will more than likely justify and create a desire for the system.

[captain_nintendo]

How come I just cant seem to believe that article :-/



I guess I will believe it when it is shown at E3  

[Tynstar]

How come I just cant seem to believe that article :-/



I guess I will believe it when it is shown at E3  

I second that. But a price tag of 99-149 would be nice.

[shaggy]

I second that. But a price tag of 99-149 would be nice.

I third that but like Tynstar said, the price is awesome!

[Lord Nepenthean]

Looks like gamesindustry.biz spoke with developers today and have found the same thing regarding the tech specs.  They didn't mention too much about the price except to say that speculation is pointing to the price points mentioned in the article I posted earlier today.

Article: http://gamesindustry.biz/...ontent_page.php?aid=13482

Revolution to be "2.5 times more powerful than Cube"
Illustration
Rob Fahey 17:07 07/12/2005

Nintendo's next-gen system won't match power of rivals, focuses firmly on innovation

Developers speaking to GamesIndustry.biz this week have commented that the the Revolution console, hardware kits for which began shipping to third parties recently, is shaping up to be around 2.5 times more powerful than GameCube.

Up until the past week or so, developers close enough to Nintendo's inner circle to have seen any Revolution hardware were working with development kits that were simply GameCube kits with mock-ups of the "wand" controller attached - a clear signal, if any were required, that the system is more about innovative control than about the hardware specs.

Now, however, Nintendo has spoken to developers in more depth about its hardware plans for the new system - and has begun shipping more advanced development kits to selected third-parties, featuring early versions of some of the chips which will appear in the final console.

An article published by US website IGN this morning revealed some details of the console, and several developers today have spoken to GamesIndustry.biz to help fill in the gaps.

The picture we're building up of the final console is as follows; the Cube will be powered by the IBM CPU codenamed Broadway, which is very similar to the Gekko CPU used in the GameCube, but runs at around twice the clock speed and offers potentially two to three times the overall performance, and the ATI graphics chip codenamed Hollywood.

While Broadway is well-understood by developers, the ATI part remains "a bit of a black box", according to one senior developer we spoke to. "We have theoretical throughput figures and stats from Nintendo, but nobody's seen the hardware yet - we're just treating it like it's a faster version of the GameCube GPU, at the moment."

How much faster exactly it will be remains to be seen, but the chip - which "seems to be an evolution of the Radeon range" according to our source - will probably mirror the CPU by running at around twice to three times the speed of the existing part.

In terms of RAM, the system is well-known to boast 512MB of Flash RAM which can be used to store save games and downloaded content, but this will not be accessible to developers, we were told. What they'll have available is 96MB of main memory, built on the same 1T-SRAM architecture as the Cube, and "a few megs here and there for other stuff" - such as 3MB of on-board memory on the graphics chip, which will be used for a frame buffer. "That's plenty, since the Revolution isn't supporting HDTV," one developer added.

As for the storage media the Revolution will use, "they're pretty much standard DVDs," we were told, with capacity similar to current PS2 and Xbox discs. "The only clever thing about the drive, really, is that you can put the little Cube discs into it despite being a slot-loading drive - I think that's the first time you've been able to do that with a slot loader."

In other words, what Nintendo is planning to ship is a system which is no more than around twice to three times as powerful as the current generation GameCube - indeed, more than one developer who has access to the hardware specs suggested "about 2.5 times the power" as the benchmark for the new system.

Although this makes the Revolution significantly less powerful than the PS3 or Xbox 360, developers we spoke to were upbeat about the machine.

"You can basically treat it like a current generation machine," one told us. "The time it'll take to ramp up to developing on this is basically nil - we can just work on a PC or maybe an Xbox, and then improve the quality of our assets when we move to the Revolution. Or even work on a Cube, in fact. The libraries are very similar."

"We could do a game for this in a few months," commented another developer. "Developing games is going to be easy, the challenge is going to be using the controller properly."

The approach mirrors Nintendo's strategy with the DS, which is far less powerful than its rival the PlayStation Portable but offers an innovative interface which has been a hit with gamers and has had major success in the mass market.

Crucially, the low specification will also allow Nintendo to score a victory in terms of pricing; speculation is already rife that the Revolution could enter the marketplace at $149 or even lower, suggesting a sub-GBP 100 price point at a time when the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 still retail for three times that price.

[captain_nintendo]

" is shaping up to be around 2.5 times more powerful than GameCube. "


Considering the graphic ability of the Cube now, I think I will be happy with the Revolution.

And I believe they are using "normal" size disc this time around

[PDorr3]

a possible $100 launch? damn and I thought a $200 launch would be awsome, I cant wait!

[Izret101]

Well if they are using "normal" DVDs this could turn out like DC or 3DO or similair systems where people will just need to rip and burn a game to replay it.

They must have SOME kind of deturrent to this.